Coastal house prices soar by £400 a month over past decade

Diane King

We do like to be beside the seaside - in fact, so much that the popularity living on the coast has driven prices up and up.

Living in a seaside town has escalated in price - 25 per cent during the past decade, which is a rise equivalent to £382 a month.

The average house price in Britain’s coastal towns has, according to Halifax, increased from £181,060 in 2007 to £226,916.

However, there is a distinct north-south divide in property values. Nine of the 10 most expensive seaside towns are on the southern coast of England, with Sandbanks, near Poole in Dorset, is Britain’s most expensive seaside town in which to buy a home for the second year in a row, with the average house price now £664,051.

South-eastern coastal towns are often within commutable distance of London, which has pushed up property values.

However, nine out of the 10 least expensive seaside towns located in Scotland with Port Bannatyne, on the Isle of Bute, having an average home cost of just £71,550.

Newbiggin by the Sea in Northumberland, and Campbeltown, Girvan and Millport, all in Western Scotland, have seaside homes for under £80,000.

But it may already be too late to grab a bargain - property values in Fraserburgh in Aberdeenshire have soared by 95 per cent since 2006, to £136,889.

And in the Shetlands, Lerwick has seen rises of 77 per cent, while in Inverbervie they are up 62 per cent.

In England, homes in Shoreham by Sea, near Brighton, have seen the biggest risers, with prices up by 70 per cent, followed by those in Aldeburgh in East Anglia at 67 per cent.